Pogacar won with a broken bike, the brakes rubbing, and the gears stuck after the crash

Tadej Pogacar's victory in the 2026 Milan-San Remo was already extraordinary in itself, but the details that have come to light after the race elevate it to an even more difficult level to explain. The Slovenian not only won after a fall before the Cipressa, but he did so with a significantly damaged bike and with the brake discs constantly rubbing.

Pogacar won San Remo with a broken bike and without knowing it

According to Bostjan Kavcnik, mechanic for the UAE Team Emirates-XRG, in an interview with the Slovenian newspaper Delo, the fall occurred on the left side, just before one of the key points of the course. And beyond the broken equipment we saw live, the impact also affected the frame, which ended up cracking. But the team did not make any changes because the rider himself did not detect the severity of the problem at that moment.

“If Tadej had known the state of the bike, he would not have descended so aggressively that even Tom Pidcock could not follow him.”

The brake discs also became misaligned and were constantly rubbing (the bike was slowing down), which implies a direct loss of performance with every pedal stroke. In a race where every watt counts, that detail takes on enormous relevance.

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“His frame broke in the fall and the disc was rubbing against the braking surface.”

With that context, what happened at the Cipressa takes on another dimension. Pogacar had to make up positions, take longer lines in several corners, and still recorded the fastest ascent ever registered on that climb. All of this with a bike that was not in optimal condition.

To that scenario, another added problem arose. The electronic shifting went into protection mode after the fall, locking the system. For a few seconds, the Slovenian was stuck in a hard gear, forced to accelerate without being able to shift normally. He was the one who solved the situation during the race.

“Tadej managed to get the shifting working again himself, he didn’t notice anything else strange and that’s why we didn’t change the bike.”

This accumulation of circumstances makes it even harder to understand what happened next. On the Poggio, he was able to drop Mathieu van der Poel at the key moment and ended up resolving the race in a sprint against Tom Pidcock. All of this without a bike in perfect condition.